Blog

Engagement Manager

31 Jul 2024

AI is believed to be the greatest technological advance of this generation, and in the climate space we’re seeing the emergence of many AI-enabled solutions. However, there have been widespread reports over the last yearregarding AI's high energy consumption resulting in AI becoming a leading contributor to the climate crisis

Nurturing growth

Surawoot Tanasen

Research and Process Manager

02 Feb 2024

Tackling food insecurity in the UK with micro-scale vertical farms and inspiring the next generation of urban growers

Increasing the barrier makes us jump higher

Engagement Manager

13 Dec 2023

How regulating to stymie innovation can end up accelerating it

The Valley of Death for New Medicines

Senior Engagement Manager

15 Nov 2023

The biotechnology sector is filled with the promise of new cancer treatment approaches, such as immunotherapy, but the financial stumbling blocks could prevent these advances from reaching patients.

The tranquilizing drug of incremental innovation

Engagement Manager

18 Oct 2023

How the comfort of the marginal gain can sleepwalk a company into the abyss

Heat pumps – what next?

15 Sep 2023

Heat pumps – what next?

Why you probably won’t be charging your electric car in 2 minutes

How technology can tackle diaper waste

Engagement Director

17 Aug 2023

Why you probably won’t be charging your electric car in 2 minutes

Disposable diapers - A Messy Business

24 Jul 2023

How the FemTech revolution is fighting for women’s rights in healthcare

14 Jun 2023

Women’s health has been notoriously neglected throughout history, as the healthcare sector didn’t escape the trend of men creating a world for males. The FemTech Revolution in recent years has been trying to change this healthcare dynamic for the better.

Leapfrogging anaerobic digestion: tackling the food waste challenge

Senior Engagement Manager

24 May 2023

From plate to planet: reducing food waste for a sustainable future

Graphene: decades of promise

Emily Pugsley

Senior Engagement Manager

04 Apr 2023

When graphene was first discovered in the early 2000s, it was described as having some of the greatest material properties discovered – so why, almost 20 years later, is it not used in our day-to-day lives?

Addressing the unintended consequences of decarbonisation

Engagement Director

06 Mar 2023

Decarbonisation: The quest for clean energy requires us to untangle the web of unintended consequences. It's like trying to solve a puzzle while simultaneously creating new pieces

Risk. Nothing to worry about

Floating wind has long been hailed as a key tool in our fight against climate change, but outside of industry news and regional papers, it only sporadically appears in our newsfeed.

Engagement Manager

13 Feb 2023

Risk, or specifically risk tolerance, is one of the factors that has enabled innovators for centuries; it is risk or specifically risk tolerance that has progressed human development, not its avoidance.

The floating winds of change

15 Jan 2023

Averting the plastic waste crisis: the role of enzymes in eating the problem

Senior Engagement Manager

14 Dec 2022

The potential role of PET eating enzymes in solving the plastic waste crisis

The Role of Bacteriophage in the Fight Against AMR

Senior Engagement Manager

08 Nov 2022

No action today, no cure tomorrow

Share buybacks: an attack on R&D

Engagement Manager

27 Oct 2022

Share buybacks are one of the reasons for the inflated valuations currently in the market, meanwhile R&D spending has stagnated.

Current events

Anthropogenic climate change is a politically motivated hoax... discuss.

To GMO or not to GMO, that is the question

Engagement Director

12 Oct 2022

I read the above statement online a few weeks ago and it got my back up, so I wrote about it

Shrinkflation

Bilal Alim

Engagement Manager

16 Sep 2022

The ‘hidden’ form of inflation

To GMO or not to GMO

31 Aug 2022

Agbio

Second order effects - First class opportunities

Engagement Manager

16 Aug 2022

The unconsidered secondary problems of decarbonisation are some of the greatest opportunities for companies with the knowhow.

Decarbonisation

Please mind the gap: closing the circularity gap in an increasingly linear world

Senior Engagement Manager

03 Aug 2022

While recycling infrastructure has expanded, economic growth, increased production and consumption continue to widen the gap in an increasingly linear world

Circular Economy

Becoming Supply Chain Savvy

Senior Engagement Manager

19 Jul 2022

It could be assumed that a soil carbon measurement technology would be most attractive to farmers, however, it is apparent that the entire supply chain needs to be addressed and connected, otherwise an opportunity might be missed.

Technology application and adoption

The Potential of Fungi

Christina Vaschuk

Engagement Manager

Senior Engagement Manager

13 Jul 2022

The global mycelium market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 7.3% to reach $5.5 Billion by 2030, according to InsightAce Analytic. The market is booming, with biotechnology startups and investors entering the space due to its various applications for the Food & Beverage, Animal Feed, Packaging, Clothing and Apparel industries. Rapid Innovation’s AgBio team envision a fundamental shift ...

Agbio

Mind the gap: a decade of growth at RIG

Partner

11 Jul 2022

From 2013 to 2022, two views on RIG: an interview with Ffion and Anya

“We know more about space than we know about the ocean"

Christina Vaschuk

Engagement Manager

Thea Pease

Practice Director

04 Jul 2022

Getting into the (sea)weeds (Sorry, we couldn't kelp ourselves).

Blue Economy

The Importance and Value of Creating an ICP

Engagement Director Jack Straker (JCS) interviews new-starter Emily Pugsley (EP)

Senior Engagement Manager

17 Jun 2022

An ‘Ideal Customer Profile’ (ICP) is a tool we often use at RIG - a set of narrowly defined hypotheses that pinpoints the type of customer most suited for utilising the technology that is being commercialised.

Product-Market Fit, Technology application and adoption

An engineer and a poet walk into a bar…

14 Jun 2022

About RIG

Product-market fit in deep tech

Engagement Director

12 May 2022

“Build it and they will come”. Sadly, they probably won’t. So why not do the hard work up-front and secure your market before you do anything else. Investors will love you for it.

Product-Market Fit

The innovator’s tug of war: push and pull innovation and the Technology-Push Lead User Concept

Feedback should be viewed as a tool for improvement, not a weapon

Senior Engagement Manager

05 May 2022

One of the challenges of technology innovation is the balancing act of identifying an application which responds to market needs (“pull”) and is informed by the technology’s attributes (“push”). The Technology-Push Leader User Concept (T-PLUC) blends push and pull innovation to inform the development and application of a given technology.

Product-Market Fit

Feedback on your feedback

25 Apr 2022

Personal development

Dairy farming and Scope 3 emissions: Why sustainable changes must be aligned with economic benefits

Thea Pease

Practice Director

18 Apr 2022

There is huge potential for the food industry to reduce their carbon footprint whilst educating consumers on the benefits of dairy farming; however, a ‘wait and see’ approach may lead to missed opportunities

Agbio, Current events

In defence of gasification

Emily Pugsley

Senior Engagement Manager

11 Apr 2022

Assessing the sustainability of new technologies: can we ever find one perfect solution or will it always remain a grey area?

Advanced Fuels, Circular Economy

MDF recycling: a safety net against volatile raw material prices

You could argue that progress with batteries is good. That said, there are numerous geographic, geopolitical, and humanitarian challenges to address across the lithium-ion batteries supply chain.

Senior Engagement Manager

04 Apr 2022

Long term availability of virgin timber is becoming increasingly problematic. MDF Recovery's technology offers security against rising virgin timber prices and fragile supply chains.

Waste to Product, Current events

Progress, despair, hope - the dark past and bright future of energy storage

12 Aug 2021

Energy storage

Power & Portability

20 Jul 2021

The invisible restraint of the apparent newfound freedom of battery-powered phones is that these devices need charging up– we can only stray so far from a power socket for so long.

Energy storage

Myth or Reality? Exploring the high flying aspirations of Vertical Farming

Thea Pease

Practice Director

08 Jun 2021

The Hanging Gardens of Babylon were built, it is said, around 600 BC by King Nebuchadnezzar II for his wife Amytis, because she missed the verdant landscapes of her native Media (modern-day Iran). Descriptions of these gardens also suggest that they could be considered the first example of a vertical farm, with a series of stacked terraces irrigated by manually operated water pumps.

[Almost] three months in

Engagement Director

10 May 2021

To say my RIG journey began in unusual circumstances is somewhat of an understatement. Three zoom meetings and several phone calls were the only interaction with my future colleagues the global pandemic afforded me before my first day. Actually, that’s not quite true, I did meet a masked Simon for about five minutes to pick up my laptop.

About RIG

A new atmosphere: reflections on holding concerts and winning clients in the time of COVID-19

Simon Jackson

Director

03 Jul 2020

For over 5 years, I have been hosting ‘house concerts’ where touring international musicians play a private gig in my flat to an audience of friends and friends of friends. The gigs are intimate affairs -both for the physical proximity, and because there can be lots of interaction. And sometimes there’s a level of connection between artist and audience such that at the end of the even...

Don't try harder, iterate faster

As a child, bin lorries meant it was Friday. A weekly ritual on our drive to school involved tailing the cumbersome machines through the narrow streets of York, watching them decant the waste of household after terraced-household into their gaping maws; a weekly interaction with a great infrastructural marvel which miraculously transported away the waste of each dwelling never to be s...

Founder and Managing Director

19 Jun 2020

Trying harder while generally doing the same thing is not the recipe for finding product market fit or finding early traction. It is a recipe for running out of runway. It is also a very human reaction.

Circular Economy, Deal Execution

To all AgriFood workers, thank you

Peter Higgins

Partner

15 Jun 2020

It has been a while since I wrote a blog. Too long. I feel I should write one once a month maybe even once a week. Last week I got a virtual tap on the shoulder from my colleagues who manage our marketing activities. My turn. I was up to write a blog.

A Landfill Perspective: Pit half full, or half empty?

04 Jun 2020

Surprise! Innovation, market process and 'the nature of discovery'

01 May 2020

Confined to our homes during the pandemic, many of us have taken up new hobbies, exercise regimens or new learning. While my physical fitness has taken a hit in the six weeks since the RIG team started working from home, I have joined an online microeconomics course in an effort to cajole myself into a productive lockdown.

Commercialisation

Sharing a watering hole with a dinosaur

09 Apr 2020

I am drinking the same water as a T-Rex. My inner child (not buried particularly deep, I am told) is a big fan of this fact. As far as we know, since humans existed, we have not created any ‘new’ water and comparatively little has escaped to space. On the face of it, water isn’t going anywhere, and there is loads of it. It should be noted that there is a big difference between freshwa...

Metamorphosis

24 Mar 2020

23 June is a date that will forever fill me with great happiness and faith in our country. Of course, I refer to the glorious day, in 2014, when the former Member of Parliament for Tatton, the first Chancellor from a northern seat since Dennis Healey in the late 1970s, delivered his vision of the “Northern Powerhouse” from Manchester. Finally, I thought, a government that is going to ...

Sustainability

Reflections on entry level hiring

We are all probably aware to varying degrees that the levels of air pollution in the UK are too high, but we perhaps do not understand the full extent of the issue. According to Defra, the annual health cost of particulate matter alone is estimated to be around £16 billion and as a Uk average, 5.3 out of every 100 deaths are the result of air pollution. This figure is far higher for L...

Founder and Managing Director

29 Feb 2020

Since January 1st, I no longer lead the process of recruiting and selecting entry level hires. Entry-level hiring is a serious responsibility. We are who we hire. And who we hire is formative in terms of what we can become. In a knowledge firm, talent acquisition and development is the business strategy. Making this move is a generational shift that will bring those driving the proces...

About RIG

Opportunity to innovate in air pollution

29 Feb 2020

Control your digital presence and harness the vitality of web-based communication

08 Jan 2020

A big part of my job is to bridge the gap between our portfolio companies and the markets they serve. I speak with potential customers on a daily basis about a particular novel technology and the possible value it can unlock; I have found that a large part of successful commercialisation and deal making is in the effective presentation and communication of the product, solution, or se...

Diversity unlocks innovation

08 Jan 2020

Globalisation and advances in technology have radically altered the way that information is exchanged, ideas and innovations are diffused, trade occurs, and companies collaborate and grow internationally. The multiple dynamics of globalization—financial flows, migration of labour and work, technological innovations, environmental sustainability, and cultural dynamics—form a turbulent ...

Competition versus compensation: the importance of speed to market in agtech

10 Dec 2019

In any industry, executives and consultants prize the concept of ‘speed to market’ highly. This is usually the result of the belief that if you don’t do it, someone else will – and, as with at least a majority of oft-repeated business phrases, it contains a degree of truth.

From Dante to Decarbonisation

23 Oct 2019

Having left the world of science at school, I read medieval Italian poetry at university and thought to myself “finally – something I can study with real world application!” I slightly rued my artsy background when I took an MBA which involved some mathematics: the GMAT (“how is one not a prime?”), financial accounting (“how come income statements have expenses?”), Excel modelling (“h...

Getting ready for the waste revolution

18 Oct 2019

Waste. Rubbish. Trash. Whatever you wish to name it, it litters the everyday landscape of our lives. Its ubiquitous presence flickers on the edges of our consciousness whether strolling down London streets, picnicking on beaches, or meandering through national parks. And this is simply the waste we can see. Even 'prisine' areas of wilderness have not been left untouched by the ramific...

Egg-laying and milk-giving wool-pig

James Evangelou

Practice Director

24 Sep 2019

Idioms don’t always translate well across different languages and cultures, but I thought this particular German phrase was a visceral and compelling image as a warning to early-stage companies not to be “all things to all people.”

Commercialisation

Getting fit for fundraising

20 Sep 2019

A recent blog by Fred Wilson resonated with me and motivated me to write my next blog. In his blog, Fred reflects on the decision by WeWork to postpone their listing and uses the term “hair on a deal” to describe when a deal has too many issues which ultimately kill the investment. The critical lesson for entrepreneurs he highlights is the importance of having your house in order befo...

Competition: a missed opportunity to be embraced

07 Aug 2019

Who is your competition and how are you differentiated? This is a critical component of both commercialisation and fundraising, around which technology developers have significant scope to improve their current approach. Too often, companies are unwilling to tackle this topic in the depth it deserves. Whether this is due to fear, naivety, arrogance, ‘blissful ignorance’, or inexperien...

Borrowing economics to save the world?

Shipping touches pervasively but unobtrusively on every aspect of our daily lives; from the clothes we wear, to the food we eat, to the goods we order online. But rarely do we think about the negative environmental ramifications caused by it. These environmental impacts include air pollution, water pollution, noise, and oil pollution. Greenhouse gas emissions from shipping currently r...

Partner

20 Jun 2019

It is hard to ignore the noise currently being made about climate change. Be it Extinction Rebellion, Greta Thunberg, or Michael Bloomberg, it is certainly a topic that has made its way into the public consciousness this year and let’s hope that it stays there.

Setting sail to decarbonisation

19 Apr 2019

Industrial Decarbonisation

From Lab to First Adopters

13 Apr 2019

When it comes to finding Product-market Fit (PMF), entrepreneurial vision is helpful but insufficient. Landing on the moon may be the vision but it requires precise and completely accurate calculations to actually get there.

What is IP? And how to best leverage it?

10 Aug 2018

We at Rapid Innovation Group are in the business of IP commercialisation. When we disaggregate that term, the most debate within the company, and a healthy debate it is I must add, is what does the term commercialisation mean. Is it sales and revenue generation at its most basic, or is it something far more fundamental than that? That’s a topic for another time and for someone with a ...

Energy storage: generation’s forgotten twin

I’m one of those annoying people that thinks Schrodinger’s Cat is an apt substrate for pretty much any old mixed metaphor that I can drag in. Apologies in advance.

Partner

31 May 2018

In recent years, the conversation around renewable energy sources has grown broader and louder. Although wind, solar, and their lesser-known cousins do not (yet) represent a majority of energy generation in the vast majority of countries, they form an increasingly significant part of the grid’s energy mix. Indeed, in 2017 – and for the first time in its history – Britain generated mor...

Sustainability

Schrödinger’s Mongrel (and pricing equity in early-stage deep-tech)

03 May 2018

Doing the right deal

20 Apr 2018

Throughout the history of deal-making, folks have conceived of successful negotiations as being the ones where they “won.”

How early is too early: knowing when to engage your customer

Cycling home over Waterloo bridge a couple of weeks ago I was surprised by my breathlessness and coughing fit that ensued. At first I thought it was a testament to my fitness levels, but turning on the news that night my concern grew from its initial trivial and personal worry.

Partner

21 Feb 2018

“But we need to develop 3 phases of prototypes, go through accelerated life testing, and get 10 patents granted”. Or so go the usual protestations against early market engagement. The value of bringing partners and customers into the conversation at an early stage is often trumped by fear. “They’ll steal my technology”. “It isn’t advanced enough”. “They won’t understand it”.

Air pollution: a public health concern

24 Jan 2018

Life is beautiful: in memory of JP

02 Jan 2018

JP had all of the energy and passion of the entrepreneur.He was also a lovely man. Full of good cheer and resilient enthusiasm.

Start Small

15 Dec 2017

A CEO we are working with asked me today about how large a deal she should look to do with an agricultural foundation that could become a big partner. As her company’s technology solves a major problem for them, she was aware that there was the potential to do a big initial deal but her instinct was to start small.

Closing

30 Oct 2017

Closing any deal is an event created by a process.

The draw of a silly assumption

30 Sep 2017

On paper it might make sense: hire a commercially minded executive who has ridden the tiger at a fabulously successful growth company, who has been there and done that, and low and behold the same result will transpire.

The economic challenge that must be incorporated into design

19 Apr 2017

Recently I have been working in the renewable energy field and two pieces of insight highlighted two key mistakes that innovators, but particularly engineering and science based start-ups, are prone to making.Mistake 1: talking to the market after key design elements have already been locked down.Mistake 2: failing to consider the economic envelope in which their innovation needs to p...

Water: it’s a precious resource, let’s start treating it as such!

Peter Higgins

Partner

01 Feb 2017

I initially started writing this blog in the summer when it was so hot that I was struggling to sleep and was drinking water like it was on tap (but it is on tap Peter!)

How to develop a business and yourself

As an early stage technology company, the early deals done with big companies can set the course for the business for some time into the future. Getting them done is rarely simple, but the first step is to make sure you have the right champion.

Founder and Managing Director

12 Jan 2017

Developing a business and developing yourself have a lot in common. Fundamentally they both involve learning.

About RIG

“I want to take a company from the lab to its first million and beyond”: An interview with James Evangelou on his 1 year RIG anniversary

James Evangelou

Practice Director

18 Nov 2016

James Evangelou joined Rapid Innovation Group in September 2015 after graduating from Cambridge and spending 6 month teaching English in Colombo. He spent a lunch with RIG Engagement Manager, Ffion Rolph, talking success, challenges, and his bid to take over RIG.

About RIG

Pick your champion

18 Nov 2016

Overcoming the listed company innovation paradox

21 Oct 2016

I was recently interviewed as part of a research project into corporate innovation by a group seeking to establish how large corporates could create new service and product lines. It was early in the morning, so I was at my most blunt.

Negotiation Tools

16 Jun 2016

Successful commercialisation requires a great technology with differentiated IP, a sound strategy with clear execution, and a little bit of unexpected foresight.

Fifteen Thousand Pounds – The Cost to Dig Your Own Hole

27 Apr 2016

“Fifteen thousand pounds” That’s the point I knew the client had lost the deal. And with the deal, the long term viability of the company.

When should I start commercialisation?

15 Apr 2016

The lean approach to software creation has brought market testing much earlier in the life cycle of a product. Its aim is to try to find market acceptance as soon as possible so that companies minimise the risk of building products that turn out to be not sufficiently compelling.

Want to succeed? Get used to failure.

Have you ever been asked (or been the one asking): Why are our conversion rates so poor? If so you have probably also been asked (or asked): What can we do to improve them?

Partner

01 Mar 2016

A few years ago, at a startup networking event, a colleague of mine asked a budding entrepreneur how he was going to grow and scale a business. His response? “Build the app. Marketing. Go viral.”

Garbage in, garbage out! It’s all about the process.

22 Dec 2015

A conversation with RIG’s founder